a prayer

Lord, You are in power, enthroned on high for all eternity. Lord, I want things to be made right. I confess that they haven't been for so long. It's beyond my control, but for You all things are possible. Please, Lord, make things right. May we be Your vessels of love and forgiveness and change.

I've been numb for so long that I barely remember what it feels like to feel things correctly. The last time I remember crying and praying like this was when Your Spirit allowed me to realize my role as a leader after the summer camp was over. I ached and cried on my drive back to Indiana, for the youth who were there, for how much they need the love of Christ continually, for how much they need to be lights in the darkness of the situations that only they will know, for the role that I had, for the many ways that I failed.

You gave me a heart of flesh. But gracious God, I gave it up in time, allowing pain and loneliness and disappointment to harden it again. Lord, I ask Your forgiveness, not on the basis of who I am or what I do or could do. I ask Your forgiveness fully knowing that I am a sinner who has chosen to sin, to separate myself from rightness with You, that I deserve nothing from You. But You had compassion on me before I even had life in my mother's womb, for You knew what would occur. Jesus Christ humbled himself by public humiliation, beatings, and death on a cross for my sake. Because of Your infinite love for mankind and the atonement of Jesus Christ who suffered death and was resurrected on the third day, I ask forgiveness. Make me a new creation as I seek You more dearly each day.

I need You, Lord. I gave up what I struggled to keep for so long. And the challenges have come so much since that time. I seek rest but find none. I fall, I fail. I stumbled and feel as though I will never be able to walk the straight and narrow path effectively. I long for a helper but find none. The struggles continually invade my life, my mind and my heart. In my weakness, old habits take over. Your power is made perfect in weakness, while my life falls apart. I become self-centered and judgmental, angry at my pain. Lord, please come and lift me up again. Show me a better way. Teach me to stand and to walk. Guide me all of my days. Be my God, my rescue, my rock, my confidant, my shield and my horn of strength. Lord, help me to come back into a right relationship with You and with others. And if it be Your will, Lord, may I be given the chance to make things right once more. Otherwise, oh Lord, please take this desire from me, for it is too much to bear. May my hope be placed in Your holy things above all else. Lord, show me a better way. Show us a better way. You alone are sovereign, alleluia.